The solve-it-all machine

The big yellow ball in the sky was turning red during its slow descent behind the horizon. And a yellow pegasus was finally coming back home. Fluttershy was glad to be back. It had been interesting to see all the weird machines and she had been impressed by Rainbow Dash’s demonstration. Nonetheless, it was just way too complicated in comparison of her good home and all of her little critters friends.

“Miss Fluttershy!” said a voice coming from a pony who himself was coming to her. “I’m so glad you’re finally back… What are you doing?”

Fluttershy came from behind the rock where she had jumped, apologized and asked what the pony wanted.

“I’m delivering the chimp from Huffington’s zoo.” replied the pony. “And I must say I’m quite glad not to be responsible of that creature anymore!”

Fluttershy’s face lit up. She had been expecting to see that creature all week. Not only that, but after all the machines and all the magic, she was finally back into her element.

“Where is he?” she asked with high expectations.

“In his cage.” the delivering pony replied. “Just wait until I’m gone to open it, please. I think he doesn’t like me.”

“Of course. Thank you so much.” Fluttershy responded with joy.

“Oh no. Thank you. And good luck.”

The pony quickly ran away and Fluttershy went to the cage the pony had brought. She took the drape away and saw one of the cutest most adorable enraged drooling bity chimp she had ever seen.

“Hello. My name is Fluttershy. Don’t be afraid: I want to become your friend.”

But she had to retract her hoof very quickly to avoid an attack from the chimp who was obviously not in the mood for any friendly talk. Fluttershy deduced that he was grumpy because of all the time he had passed inside the cage and decided to free him.

Instantly, the chimp ran out of her view. She went after him but he entered the house by an open window, forcing her to go around by the door. Before she could even begin to move though, she heard the sound of objects breaking inside, and all the complaining and frustrated screams and cries of the other animals who didn’t like the chimp’s behavior one bit.

Taking action, Fluttershy entered and saw that all her little friends were hiding on top of Harry the bear’s shoulders, facing the chimp who was threatening them with a broom and a drinking bowl.

“Hum… excuse me.” the shy pegasus tried without much success.

The chimp jumped forward with a loud shriek, startling the bear who fell back, making all the other animals fall in a horrible mess of dust and screams.

“You really shouldn’t do things like that.” Fluttershy tried again.

But the chimp ignored her. Satisfied to have gotten rid of all the pesky critters, he began to run around and basically just rip off the wallpaper as he went.

“Please…” Fluttershy tried one last time.

She could have tried to convince the “Negative Refusal Association” to say yes to something and obtained the exact same absence of result. It was just useless. Understanding she had no other choice, she resorted to a new approach.

“Stop that immediately!” she ordered.

The chimp suddenly stopped, afraid of that change. He looked at Fluttershy to assess the situation, but the yellow pony exploited the opportunity.

“Your behavior is beyond tolerable. You should be ashamed of yourself!” she said. “I expect you to apologize right now and adopt a more civilized attitude. Understood?”

The chimp shrieked a bit to explain he didn’t do anything and that it wasn’t his fault and some other lies, but Fluttershy stood inflexible, so, eventually, to the other animals’ relief, the chimp agreed to stay quiet and not create any more disturbance.

“Good. I’m proud of you. You’ll see, you’ll find it very pleasant after a while and you’ll make a lot of friends here.” Fluttershy told him with a smile.

She reassured some critters who were still shocked by what had happened, and told them all to wait until she would come back as she wanted to make some formal presentation to welcome the chimp in. She just had to go seek some specific food that she had seen with the cage as she was certain the chimp was very hungry after his trip.

She didn’t even have to come back to understand things weren’t going to be as easy as she thought they would. Mostly because of the many animals running out of the house, the racket coming from inside the cottage and the bear coming through one of the wall who growled in anger and went back inside to settle his counts with a certain chimp.

Three times fluttershy used all the means to her disposal to calm the chimp and make him behave in a better way, but three times the chimp began spreading chaos and destruction again, even after having been exposed to the stare. In the end, Fluttershy had to resolve to put the chimp back into his cage as a temporary solution.

Still, that was no real solution at all and Fluttershy needed one, even if she had no idea how she was going to find it.

Fluttershy had a problem she needed to solve.